By Patti Weaver

 

  (Stillwater, Okla.) — A 64-year-old Cushing man, who is serving a two-year prison term for possessing a large amount of child pornography on his computer at his office in Tulsa, was given a concurrent five-year prison term Wednesday for possessing more than 1,000 images of child sexual abuse material on his laptop and hard drives at his home in May of 2022.
    Since Associate District Judge Michael Kulling ruled Wednesday that Glenn Allen Fogle’s sentence from Payne County would run at the same time as his sentence from Tulsa County, with credit for the nine months he has been in custody, he was given only an additional three years in prison. The judge ordered that when Fogle is released from prison, he will be on probation for 10 years during which he must follow rules for sex offenders, have no unsupervised contact with minor children, and have no internet or social media.
    At his sentencing hearing, Fogle told the judge that although he was addicted to child pornography for about eight years, “I’m already rehabilitated. I’ve already kicked my addiction. I want to make amends for my crimes. I could not be more remorseful. I never shared any pornography. I never had any inappropriate relationships.”
    Fogle, who said he had been a highly successful investment manager named in national publications, told the judge he became addicted to pornography after he suddenly lost his job after 19 years at a company, became unemployed for five and one-half years, and his wife, with whom he had two biological children and four adopted girls, left him. He said he seriously contemplated suicide and was obsessed with his failures.
    Fogle said, “I stumbled across child pornography accidentally,” explaining that it was about a 10-year process from adult pornography to child pornography. Fogle said that when he gets out of prison, he wants to start an investment partnership to give 10 percent or more to charitable organizations.
    His estranged wife, from whom he has been separated for 10 years, and his six children were not in court at his sentencing hearing during which his sister told the judge, “He’s paid his debt to society for what he did.” She said, “Our father passed away at 96 since he’s been incarcerated. Our mother is 94. We need his help. We need him badly.”
    His former employer told the judge, “I don’t like what he did. I don’t fear him. I do not think he was a threat to any children.” A co-worker, who maintained phone contact with Fogle in prison, testified, “He wants to influence other people to keep this from happening. He plays piano for church at DOC. I do not fear this man. I would trust my wife and children with him.”
    In stunning contrast to the portrait painted of Fogle by himself and his supporters, Tulsa Police Detective Eric Leverington, who has been assigned to the sexual predator unit since 2017 and is a member of the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, described the horrendous child pornography he found on Fogle’s computer and hard drives in his bedroom in his Cushing home.
    “I focused on the child sex material on little kids, at least 1,300 images, mostly age 5 and under, also infants and a one-year-old, predominantly very young girls, also some boys,” the Tulsa PD detective told the judge. He had begun an investigation of Fogle after an Information Technology support person for Fogle’s employer on April 29, 2022, “notified the Tulsa Police Department that he had located possible child pornography on the work computer,” of Fogle, according to the detective’s affidavit.
    “I literally followed him from his office in Tulsa to his house in Cushing on Country Club Drive,” the detective said. He testified in shocking detail about the abuse depicted on photographs and videos that he said were downloaded from 2012 “right before his arrest in 2022.” The abuse victims in about 35 photos were known to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the detective testified.
    Arguing to the judge that Fogle “has already been punished to a certain extent,” his court-appointed attorney Jodie Gage urged that his Payne County sentence should run concurrently to his Tulsa County case. “Mr. Fogle has accepted responsibility for his actions. He is not a repeat offender. He had been a very successful, very privileged individual. He is intelligent, well-spoken. He fell into pornography addiction.”
    But Payne County Assistant District Attorney Debra Vincent told the judge that Fogle deserved the maximum sentence of life in prison and urged that he be given no less than 20 years. “For approximately a decade before his arrest, there were over 1,000 images of child sex abuse material. This is the most vile sexual abuse. These are memorializations of the most heinous crimes imaginable.”
    Since Fogle had pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography without an agreement with the prosecution regarding his penalty, his sentence was entirely up to the judge, who noted, “These are exceptionally difficult cases. Mr. Fogle has accomplished many positive things in his life. He committed a very serious offense. People who possess it create a market for child pornography.” The judge then announced his sentence of 15 years with the last 10 suspended, to run concurrently to Fogle’s Tulsa County sentence of two years in prison followed by eight years of probation.